Evidentialism and Reformed Epistemology

KEVIN HARRIS: A very warm welcome to Reasonable Faith with Dr. William Lane Craig. It’s Kevin Harris. I want to give you a quick rundown on some of the podcast topics coming up. As you may know, Dr. Jordan Petersen shared the platform with Dr. Craig several years ago. Dr. Petersen has produced a video message to the Christian church, and it is very interesting. Dr. Craig has some thoughts on it, so stay close. That podcast is coming up in a few days. Also, if you’ve been listening to Reasonable Faith for very long, you may have noticed that every few years someone publishes a critique of Dr. Craig’s Reformed epistemology which examines the role of reason, arguments and evidence, and the Christian faith. It is probably one of the most misunderstood views that Dr. Craig, Alvin Plantinga, and others hold to. Dr. Craig finds himself addressing the topic again and again. Well, guess what? Some popular videos from non-theists have popped up on YouTube attacking Dr. Craig’s recent answer to a question, and it involves some of the issues of Reformed epistemology, the biblical teaching of the witness of the Holy Spirit, and things like that. So Dr. Craig is looking at the videos to see if there is anything that he thinks needs his response. But in the meantime, listen to today’s podcast. We have some highlights from past podcasts that will give you a good overview on this whole topic. It is some good stuff. Finally, if you are not doing so, we want to invite you to partner financially with the ministry of Reasonable Faith. Your support of any amount is very appreciated. Give at our website, ReasonableFaith.org, and thank you very much.

DR. CRAIG: The idea basically is that there are beliefs that we hold which I think we are rational in holding, and indeed which we know to be true and which are warranted for us which are not grounded in inference from other beliefs, from arguments and evidence. Examples of such properly basic beliefs, as they are called, would be belief in the reality of the past, belief in the external world around us, memory beliefs, beliefs that spring from testimony of others to us. These are not inferences that we make; these are properly basic beliefs that are grounded in certain experiences. Alvin Plantinga has argued that belief in God is similarly a properly basic belief, which he would say is grounded in certain experiences of the world like feelings that I am a sinner before God, or all of this was designed by God, or in the case of Christian beliefs, that when we read in Scripture that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, the Holy Spirit produces in us a conviction of the truth of that scriptural proposition. So these beliefs are warranted for us, not by way of inference or argument, but in a properly basic way.

KEVIN HARRIS: This writer says that there are some differences between your warrant basic belief model and Plantinga's. What difference is he pointing out here?

DR. CRAIG: Well, I was glad to see that he was familiar with Plantinga's Reformed epistemology and correctly interprets my view as a species of that. Where we would differ is that Plantinga thinks of the Holy Spirit as akin to a cognitive faculty, whereas I think that the Holy Spirit’s witness to us is more akin to testimony; beliefs based on testimony. For example, if I meet you and you say to me “my name is Kevin,” I believe that in a properly basic way based upon your testimony. And I think that the witness of the Holy Spirit is more like that than like an inner-cognitive faculty that I have. So, this would be a minor difference between us, but nevertheless, a difference.

KEVIN HARRIS: The writer goes on to say, “Furthermore, Craig is a bit more explicit than Plantinga with respect to whether he thinks such Holy Spirit-generated belief can function as an intrinsic defeater-defeater for objections to Christianity.” I want to back up on defeater-defeater; we have talked about defeaters.

DR. CRAIG: Right, a defeater would be a proposition that you encounter which is incompatible with a belief that you hold. So if you are going to continue to rationally hold to your belief in the face of this defeater, you need to have a defeater of the defeater. Something that would defeat that defeater, and so you are going to look for a defeater-defeater to nullify it. The question here is: could the witness of the Holy Spirit be, what Plantinga calls, an intrinsic defeater of any defeaters brought against it? An example might be my belief in the external world – the reality of the external world. Even if I had some sort of evidence that I was a brain in a vat being stimulated by electrodes or something of that sort, the belief in the reality of the external world that I perceive might be so powerful that it would be an intrinsic defeater of these defeaters brought against it. I would always be more rational to believe that there is an external world of objects that I perceive than to believe that I am just a brain in a vat being stimulated with electrodes by a mad scientist to think that there is the world of physical objects around me. The question here is: could the witness of the Holy Spirit serve as an intrinsic defeater of the defeaters that Christians encounter on occasion?

KEVIN HARRIS: You are not sure whether Plantinga has committed himself to that.

DR. CRAIG: No, it’s not entirely clear whether that is his view. He talks about it.

KEVIN HARRIS: But it is your view.

DR. CRAIG: Yes, it is the view that I am inclined to hold. This is not an inherent part of Reformed epistemology. This is an issue on which Reformed epistemologists differ, and so if I am mistaken about this, well and good, that would merely mean that the model would have to be adjusted so that the witness of the Holy Spirit would not be an intrinsic defeater-defeater, but one would need, say, rational apologetics to defeat the alleged defeaters of Christian belief.

KEVIN HARRIS: Quoting you, he says, “But I have argued the witness of the Holy Spirit is indeed an intrinsic defeater of any defeaters brought against it. For it seems to me inconceivable that God would allow any believer to be in a position where he would be rationally obliged to commit apostasy and renounce Christ. It seems to me rather, that in such a situation a loving God would intensify the Spirit’s witness in such a way that it would become an intrinsic defeater of the defeaters such a person faces.” Bill, I agree with that so much from my own life.

DR. CRAIG: Good. This was especially brought home to me when I was living in Europe and visiting the Soviet Union prior to the fall of the Iron Curtain. I met Christians in Moscow, clearly dear believers in Christ, and I remember speaking with one man and asking, “What resources do you have for your Christian life?” He said to me, “Well, there is an encyclopedia of atheism that the state publishes, and sometimes by reading that you can gain insights by looking at the views they attack.” My heart just sank for this man. Here, he had nothing but the attacks upon theism as a resource to learn about his own Christian belief, and yet, there he was surviving in that hostile environment with a vibrant and real Christian faith. It seems to me that in a situation like that, where he has nothing but defeaters of his Christian faith offered to him, that God in his love and providence would so intensify the witness of the Spirit in that man’s life that he would be able to resist the force of those defeaters; he would know they were wrong, he would know they are mistaken through the inner witness of the Holy Spirit alone. So he might experience a more intense witness of the Holy Spirit than I, living in the Western world with ample library resources and apologetic materials available to me to defeat those defeaters, would have.

KEVIN HARRIS: It is worth repeating that if something like this isn’t true it commits the majority of Christians to irrationality, because the majority of people that have come to Christ have done so on the basis of the work of the Holy Spirit and are not privy to the resources that we perhaps have in the West, or even in more elite places in the United States of America. Well, what about those people? Or they find out later how much evidence there is for it.

DR. CRAIG: This is my complaint with evidentialism. The evidentialist has to say that in certain situations what God wants these people to do is to commit apostasy and to reject Christ, because that would be what reason would compel them to do in such a case. It seems to me that is unconscionable when you look at the warnings in the book of Hebrews against apostasy, against falling away and rejecting Christ. How could anybody be obligated to apostatize and reject Christ out of his life? It would seem to me that God, through the Holy Spirit, would provide a non-inferential warrant for a person in that situation that would enable him rationally to resist the force of the defeaters that he confronts for which he has no good answer.

KEVIN HARRIS: This writer disagrees with philosopher Michael Martin, but he says, “Two common complaints about your Holy Spirit epistemology are, one, it is a form of fideism or blind faith; and two, it is an unacceptable form of dogmatism.” What would you say to those things?

DR. CRAIG: Well, it’s not fideistic because, as Plantinga points out, it is not a blind leap in the dark. Properly basic beliefs are appropriately grounded. I don’t just willy-nilly form the belief that I see a tree. I am appeared to in a tree-like way (treely), and therefore, form the belief that I see a tree in a properly basic way. Similarly, belief in God is properly basic, being grounded in the witness of the Holy Spirit. So, it’s not fideism. It’s just saying that there are sources of warrant that are other than inference and argument, and we recognize these all the time in our lives.

KEVIN HARRIS: “It’s an unacceptable form of dogmatism. That is, I guess, according to Craig, Craig is asserting that one can know that Christianity is true without evidence or at least without sufficient evidence.”

DR. CRAIG: Well, that’s not dogmatism. That is to say that there are other sources of warrant than argument and inference, and as I say, we all accept that otherwise we would be incapable of living. We would be skeptics. We wouldn’t believe in the reality of the past, we wouldn’t believe in other minds, we wouldn’t accept memory beliefs, or beliefs based in testimony.

KEVIN HARRIS: So, we are getting into an unwarranted skepticism.

DR. CRAIG: Oh, it would be an impossible skepticism. I remember George Mavrodes, Philosopher at the University of Michigan, once remarking that when one first hears of Alvin Plantinga’s epistemology what one imagines is a foundation of knowledge upon which there is built this great skyscraper of belief. But he says, in fact, on Plantinga’s view, our knowledge structure is more like a big empty lot with rambling foundations all around the lot, and here and there in a few places there will be a few bricks that are on top of the foundation, but for the most part, most of our beliefs are really properly basic beliefs that are not based on argument and evidence and inference. I think that is an apt analogy that the evidentialist, in this case, fails to appreciate.

KEVIN HARRIS: Arguments and evidence come in as support, they come in as further . . .

DR. CRAIG: Sometimes they do, but sometimes these beliefs are incapable of being inferentially argued. Take the belief in the reality of the past. How could you refute someone who says the world was created five minutes ago with built-in appearances of age? There is no way to disprove that because any evidence that you give would assume the reality of the age of things as they appear to us. So this is a properly basic belief that is rooted in our experience of the world. It is not something that you arrive at by argument and evidence. Now, of course if the non-theist says, well, but I am construing evidence here in a very broad way to mean that you have the experience of things in the past. Well, in that broad sense of evidence, then Christian belief is not without evidence. It has the evidence of the Holy Spirit. But when Plantinga talks about evidence, he is using the word in a very narrow sense to mean beliefs that are formed by inference from more basic beliefs. But Plantinga himself would say that, of course, these beliefs have evidence in this very broad sense of the word evidence, namely in this case, the evidence of the witness of the Holy Spirit.

KEVIN HARRIS: Bill, when you and I looked at this article earlier you said really this writer’s criticism can be summarized in one sentence.

DR. CRAIG: Well, no. It is one sentence. It can’t be summarized in one sentence; it is one sentence. Most of the article is a defense of so-called Holy Spirit epistemology against these misconceived criticisms, and his own criticism is not until we arrive at a single sentence in the final paragraph of the article.

KEVIN HARRIS: Go ahead, what does it say?

DR. CRAIG: Well, here’s his criticism, “At least for the majority of Christians, the Holy Spirit (if such there be) fails to present the truth of Christianity in such a way that it is anywhere near being on a par with ordinary, Moorean facts.” That is to say, facts like the belief in the external world, the belief in the reality of the past, the belief in other minds, and so it doesn't have the force and the vivacity of those sorts of beliefs for most Christians. Therefore, this Holy Spirit Epistemology fails.

KEVIN HARRIS: What is your reply to that?

DR. CRAIG: Well, the argument assumes that if this epistemology is correct that the majority of Christians should experience the truth of Christianity in a way that is on a par with the experience of these other facts, and that is simply false. For one thing, remember the example I gave of the person who is in a position where he would be rationally obliged to commit apostasy unless God were to so intensify the Holy Spirit’s witness that he would be able to resist the force of those defeaters rationally. As I said, this person might have an experience of the Holy Spirit that is far deeper and more intense than mine or Christians in general who have access to these other resources. So, it’s not true that for the majority of Christians, if the Holy Spirit epistemology is correct, that they should all experience the truth of these Christian beliefs on a par with these other intensely verified facts.

The second problem is that not only might this vary from Christian to Christian based upon their situation and God’s providence, but also it is no part of either Plantinga’s epistemology or my epistemology that all properly basic beliefs are on a par with each other in terms of their force and vivacity. Certainly some of these properly basic beliefs are warranted to us in a powerful way, like the belief in the reality of the external world. But take my properly basic belief that I left my car keys in my dresser drawer. That has no where near the force and vivacity of my belief in the external world, and yet, as a memory belief, it is a properly basic belief, and it might be quite easily defeated. Or beliefs based on testimony. For example, I believe the testimony that your name is Kevin. That doesn’t have anywhere near the force and vivacity of my belief in the reality of the past, and yet it is a properly basic belief. So it is no part of the epistemology that beliefs warranted to us by the Holy Spirit have to have the force and vivacity of such beliefs as belief in the external world or the reality of the past.

KEVIN HARRIS: Do I hear you say that there is room for some level of doubt in Holy Spirit epistemology?

DR. CRAIG: Yes, certainly, and I make this clear in Reasonable Faith. I say that to say that the witness of the Spirit is self-authenticating does not mean that it is indubitable. One should not equate this with certainty or being indubitable. It’s just that, in the end, one will be sufficiently warranted by the witness of the Holy Spirit to turn back rationally the force of any defeaters that one encounters.

. . .

What do you do in a case where you are invested emotionally in a particular conclusion and you have arguments? Well, you just do your best to look at the arguments and the evidence for the premises for and against and make up your mind, and enter into debate and dialogue in an open-minded way with those who disagree. In one sense I think ironically, embracing Holy Spirit epistemology can actually make you more objective about these arguments because, as somebody pointed out to me, your faith isn’t based on these arguments. You can give up the arguments willingly if they are refuted, and yet, your faith still remains secure because it’s rooted in the witness of the Holy Spirit. So, in one sense, I can be far more objective about the soundness of these arguments than someone who is an evidentialist whose faith stands or falls on these arguments. Similarly, I can be far more objective about them than the atheist, who, if he admits the soundness of these arguments, is going to have to change his worldview and become a theist. So, ironically, I think that holding to Holy Spirit epistemology can actually make a person far more objective in assessing the cogency of proper arguments in support of Christian Theism because he is less invested in them.

KEVIN HARRIS: In the many ways that you are not an evidentialist, would you say that evidential arguments are kind of like the icing on the cake?

DR. CRAIG: Yes, that’s right. They are great if you have them, but the vast majority of Christians in the world and down through history have not had them. I think that there are good arguments for theism and for Christian faith, but I could be wrong about that, and I would be willing to abandon the arguments if I were shown that one of the premises is more plausibly false than true. I would drop it in a moment. In fact, over the years I have revised these arguments. These arguments have been honed and revised over the years in light of the evidence and the counter-arguments by non-theists, and so I feel that I can be perfectly objective about these.

KEVIN HARRIS: Perhaps that will strengthen the premises when you encounter various objections.

DR. CRAIG: Yes, it can help you to formulate them more precisely. My formulation and defense of the moral argument, for example, has greatly changed over the years as a result of this sort of interaction.

. . .

I do not associate the witness of the Holy Spirit with my feelings. My feelings are subjective, emotional states in myself. The witness of the Holy Spirit is an objective, external reality that God bears to me. It is testimony to me, just as much as your testimony is testimony to me.

KEVIN HARRIS: There may be some associated feelings.

DR. CRAIG: Yes, just as there are associated feelings about my belief that there is an external world, or that other people exist.

KEVIN HARRIS: Well, in that case, the rest of this guy’s criticism is moot because he has misinterpreted feelings with the witness of the Holy Spirit. His final argument against it is, “If the witness of the Holy Spirit imparts a feeling of confidence about the proposition then couldn’t a period of doubt be sufficient reason for abandoning belief?” In other words, there is no room for doubt in Holy Spirit epistemology.

DR. CRAIG: Well, this gets back into the question about whether or not the witness of the Holy Spirit is an intrinsic defeater of the defeaters brought against it. Some Reformed epistemologists would say, no, it’s not. Therefore, if you are confronted with defeaters which you cannot answer, either you get some rational answer to those defeaters or you should give up Christian belief. What I want to say is that periods of doubt can be sustained because the witness of the Holy Spirit gives you warrant for those beliefs that intrinsically defeats the defeaters brought against it.

. . .

On the view enunciated by Reformed epistemologists, we have a dual source of warrant for our Christian beliefs. One would be the arguments and evidence which is what I mean here by “reason.” It's important to understand that the word “reason” here is a shorthand term for arguments and evidence. The view that I'm defending is that arguments and evidence are not necessary in order for Christian belief to be rational and even warranted, and in fact, it can be rational and warranted to believe in Christian truth even when the arguments and evidence appear to be against it. It all depends upon whether or not there is this other source of warrant besides argument and evidence. And I think that the Scriptures clearly teach that there is this other source of warrant, namely it is the witness of the Holy Spirit. This is not a subjective feeling, something you concoct yourself – a religious experience. This is an objective testimony of God himself to our spirits that the great truths of the Gospel are, in fact, true. While the sands of arguments and evidence may be shifting and vacillating over time and geography and with differing educations and backgrounds of different people, there is this more fundamental witness to the truth of Christian faith which is the witness of the Holy Spirit. So, in answer to his question: When reason is not a minister of the Christian faith, what should we do? (I take that to mean, When we don't have good arguments and evidence for the Christian faith, or when perhaps even the arguments and the evidence are against us, what should we do?) Be unreasonable? No, I'm not saying be unreasonable. I'm saying that rational belief isn't based exclusively on arguments and evidence so that you are reasonable. That's the whole point! You are reasonable in believing on the basis of the witness of the Holy Spirit. And I give a couple of arguments for this view that are intended to appeal to my fellow Christians – this is not apologetics for non-Christians, this is to persuade other Christians to adopt this epistemology. The first is that if you adopt this other view that rational belief requires the support of argument and evidence then you are going to consign most believers in the history of the world to irrationalism or unbelief (take your pick). The fact is that down through history over the millennia that the vast majority of Christian believers have not had access to good evidence and arguments for Christian belief. The historical method wasn't even developed until the Renaissance. In vast tracts of the human population on this planet the poverty, the illiteracy, the lack of access and absence of leisure time prevent people from assessing arguments for God's existence or the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus. So if you hold to this evidentialist epistemology, you are going to consign most of the world's Christians to either unbelief or to irrationalism, and that seems to me to be unconscionable.

KEVIN HARRIS: Oh, that makes so much sense. It makes so much sense. Fortunately, we have God! We have God's grace.

DR. CRAIG: Exactly. He cares about whether or not we believe or not.

KEVIN HARRIS: We have the witness of the Holy Spirit throughout history in all cultures.

DR. CRAIG: Yes. Then the second point was that if you adopt this view (called evidentialism or theological rationalism, which is again the view that belief is rational only if you have adequate evidence and argument) then I point out a person who had been given bad arguments would have a just excuse before God for his unbelief. He could say, God, those Christians only gave me this lousy banana argument from design for your existence; that's why I didn't believe. But the Bible is very clear in Romans 1 that all persons are without excuse before God for not believing in his existence. Therefore you cannot be excused even if you've been given bad arguments and evidence for the truth of the Christian faith because there is this other warrant for the truth of the Christian faith which you have to ignore and suppress in order to remain in unbelief.^[1]